


the kiss

by darkcyan



Category: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015)
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-09
Updated: 2017-10-09
Packaged: 2019-01-15 02:57:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,819
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12312462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darkcyan/pseuds/darkcyan
Summary: Napoleon glanced up, pointedly turned his attention back to the crossword, and said, "If you wanted to kiss me that badly, you could have just done it the normal way."





	the kiss

**Author's Note:**

  * For [meguri_aite](https://archiveofourown.org/users/meguri_aite/gifts).



> Dedicated to [meguri_aite](https://archiveofourown.org/users/meguri_aite/pseuds/meguri_aite) for (a) insisting that I watch this movie, and (b) betaing the consequences. :D

Things were not going according to plan.

Napoleon had avoided tripping the alarm (this time), but some inventive asshole had made a few other ...  _ improvements  _ to this vault that were making his job a great deal more difficult than necessary. 

Nothing he couldn't handle, of course, given sufficient time.  Unfortunately, that could run out at any second -- his entrance to this compound wouldn't be that difficult to find if anyone was looking. And eventually someone  _ would  _ be. 

As if they’d been listening to his thoughts, the alarms started blaring. But he was  _ almost _ there --

He blinked, and when his eyes reopened, there was a slight ringing in his ears and, in his peripheral vision, a gun pointed at his face by a minion who looked eager to use it.  Slowly, slowly, he raised his hands in apparent surrender and turned around. 

Seven men total, including the current head of the guard. He summoned up a friendly smile.  "Well, I guess you guys caught me. Now what?"

The head of the guard stepped forward and subjected him to a professional, thorough pat-down, finding Napoleon’s spare tools, both his guns, the knife in his boot, and the communication device that had been shaped to resemble a rather gaudy ear cuff. 

That last, he made a show of crushing between his thumb and forefinger.  Then, with a dismissive glance, he said “Lock him up,” and left. 

Smug bastard.

#

The cell door slammed.  Thick and solid, and unfortunately not stupid enough to have left the hinges on the inside. 

Fairly well sound-proofed, too – he could only just barely hear the four guards who had been tasked with delivering him here walk away.

He breathed, quiet and long, to the count of ten, then held his breath and listened.

Silence.

New inventory: what  _ hadn’t _ been taken away?

His false tooth, with its embedded microphone.  The much smaller speaker hidden in his other ear, carefully attached with skin-colored gum. And the soles of his shoes, carefully thickened slightly and hollowed out to contain a laser cutter in one and a spare knife in the other.     


It seemed unlikely that the latter hadn’t been noticed. More likely that  _ he _ hadn’t wanted to risk the technology falling into the wrong hands and had instead chosen a more oblique way of preventing him from making use of it.

See: his current abode, completely windowless, when he knew for a fact that there were at least a handful of cells that looked out over the sea. 

Could be better, could be worse.

Another held breath.  Another count of ten.  Still silence. 

He gently ground his teeth, activating the microphone, then sub-vocalized, “Open channel GIN.”

A pause. “Hah!” Gaby’s voice echoed tinnily in his ear, sounding irritatingly smug. “He got you, didn’t he.”

Napoleon found the most comfortable-looking corner –- along with windows, the cell also lacked a bed –- settled into it, and closed his eyes, to all appearances a simple thief weary after an unsuccessful night. “Yes,” he admitted. And, even more reluctantly, “Primary objective was not accomplished.”

“Noted.” Another pause.  “Location triangulated. You’re in the north building, near the center east-west, about 50 meters from the northern wall.”

Napoleon considered his mental map of the building. Four, maybe five rows of rooms away from the northern wall, it sounded like, and from the open water that lay not far beyond. He thought he was on the fourth floor.

… Might be dicey, but this could work.

“Need a distraction?” Gaby asked.

Napoleon hummed briefly.  “Just a getaway, if you can swing it.”  He wasn’t really in the mood –- or in the right equipment -– to swim several miles to a safer and more convenient spot to leave the water.

“I can have it there tonight,” Gaby said.

“Three days,” Napoleon countered. “Have them wait for my mark to approach.”

“Will do.” Gaby’s voice disappeared from his ear.

Eyes closed, Napoleon walked through his plan, trying to anticipate potential … interference. 

But eventually, his mind quieted, and he fell into the doze his posture implied.

#

The days passed, mostly slowly. The monotony was broken by long naps, occasionally by guards bringing food -– uninspiring, but sufficient -– and even more occasionally by guards bringing pain.

Their skills at interrogation were surprisingly decent, all things considered. Napoleon played dumb -- or rather, intelligent, accomplished, but ultimately uninterested in the finer details of what he had been trying to steal.  Not unlike some former colleagues of his.  And while the guards had clearly been well-instructed in a number of effective ways to … encourage his greater participation in the conversation, they mostly refrained from indulging in cruelty for its own sake.

He kept Channel GIN open during the interrogations, and subvocalized his interrogators’ questions when he could, to give context to his own answers. One never knew what his pain-addled brain might be induced to forget, and although his interrogators were well-enough trained not to drop many clues, it always surprised him just how much people in insular groups tended to believe “everyone” already knew.    


Morning of the third day, not long after breakfast delivery, his false molar buzzed. He carefully ground it on.

“In position and ready,” Gaby’s tinny voice reported.

“Noted.”

A few hours later, he finally heard the sound he’d been waiting for -– the muffled steps of the guards tasked to bring him food. They paused in front of the door. 

“Mark,” Napoleon subvocalized, as he listened to the very quiet jangle of keys as the guard unlocked the door.

The door opened, and he twitched, slowly blinking his eyes open. 

“Napping again, thief?” The second guard asked.  He kept his gun pointed in Napoleon’s general direction as the first guard bent to set the food down, but with nowhere near the level of rigor he had displayed that first day. 

“Not much else to do in here all day,” Napoleon agreed, breaking the sentence off with an elaborate yawn. He climbed slowly to his feet – pausing halfway, as the guard stiffened, and raising his hands. “Whoa, sorry, just wanted to know what excitement awaits my taste buds today.”

Both guards graced him with a laugh. “You’ve got a strange idea of excitement, thief,” the first guard said.

“There’s  _ really _ not much else to do here.”

He took a couple of steps closer, and stopped as the second guard’s attention abruptly sharpened. “Don’t come any closer,” he said.

“Sure, sure.” Napoleon kept his hands up and took an exaggerated half-step back. “I’m not looking to cause trouble.”

The first guard finished putting the tray on the floor -- more gruel; Napoleon would be  _ so  _ terribly sorry to miss it -- and straightened up.

"Enjoy your meal," he said mockingly, and turned.

Alarms blared.

_ Finally _ .    


Napoleon might not have superhuman strength like  _ some _ people, but he was more than capable of taking out two surprised and distracted guards of only middling skill. Especially when they were so obliging as to get in each other’s way at least as often as they got in his. 

It got a bit dicey when the second guard pulled his gun while both of Napoleon's arms were a bit occupied by grappling with the first, but a quick leg sweep knocked him down before he had a chance to aim -- seriously, had no one ever taught the guy never to pull a gun on a trained opponent who was within arm's reach? -- and, when the first guard attempted to take advantage of his shaky balance, he rolled with it; let himself fall and then used the momentum to throw the guard over his head, to be precise.

Given how skilled his interrogators had been, Napoleon had to admit he was a bit disappointed that the fight hadn't given him more trouble.

He shifted the burden in his arms -- two gun belts, guns still attached, and two walkie-talkies -- to use the ring of keys he'd also confiscated to lock the cell door on the unconscious guards, then turned and looked around. Empty hallway in both directions, intersecting with equally featureless halls once on the right and twice on the left before terminating. 

Assuming the blueprints had been mostly correct, quickest path to the north side would be -- left, down the first hallway.

He set off at an easy jog, quick but quiet, slowing at each corner to check for any more guards.  (Seriously?  They hadn't even had anyone positioned at the end of the hallway? Or had they been so lacking in discipline that the moment the alarms went off, they all ran off to look?)

He only ran into trouble once more, when a cross-hallway he hadn't noticed was so unobliging as to contain what was apparently the one guard left in this quadrant of the building who was still paying attention.

"Stop, thief!" The man yelled, drawing his gun.

Napoleon threw a walkie-talkie at the man's head. 

The distraction gave him just enough time to rush the guy; a couple solid punches and he was out.  Dragging the man into the nearest available cell wasted time he could  _ probably  _ still afford, especially given that the alternative was positive confirmation of his escape sooner rather than later; afterwards he looked at his stash -- now up to three walkie-talkies and guns, and two rings of keys -- and decided to keep a gun, a walkie-talkie, and both key rings, and tossed the rest in another cell.

(So many empty cells.  Almost like  _ someone _ had wanted to prevent him from letting loose other prisoners to help hide his escape.)

Finally, he ran out of cross corridors. Theoretically, there should just be this final row of cells between him and the north side of the building.

The alarm ceased ringing as Napoleon tried a door about halfway down the corridor; locked. It started back up a few breaths later, as he slid into the now-open cell.

A window. Good. (A clear pane of glass would have been better, but the natural light filtered through its warped frost in shades of familiar blue-grey was good enough.)

He shut the door and tossed the key rings and walkie-talkie on to the ground in front of it.  Delaying tactics, and ones unlikely to buy much time, if any -–  _ he _ probably would be light enough on his feet not to trip –- but he had no other use for them, so. It couldn’t hurt.

The walkie-talkie chattered about escapes and fugitives as Napoleon removed the laser cutter from his shoe with quick, practiced motions and started applying it to the frame of the window.

He activated his molar. “Ready.”

The window fell away. Four floors down, a handful of guards looked over at the crash of the window to the ground, and then up.  Napoleon waved, then ducked back inside before anyone got the bright idea to start shooting. One of them shouted, the sound of his voice echoed in a strange double-tone over the walkie-talkie.

Beyond them had been a high fence, a patch of mostly-barren ground, an abrupt drop-off, and then the sea.

“Gotcha,” Gaby said, then, “Incoming.”

Napoleon backed up –- just in case -– and replaced his shoe. It wouldn’t do to escape half-barefoot, after all.

_ Shunk _ .

The grappling hook shot through the window, stuck to the ceiling, and held. He yanked it out; he’d prefer not to trust his life to it  _ staying _ there. Small bits of plaster rained down on his head as he let it fall and watched it catch tight against the window.

More shouting, outside and from the walkie-talkie. 

Napoleon kicked the hook one last time to make sure it had bit into the wall good and deep, removed his jacket, flung it around the line to form a makeshift pulley, and jumped.

A few of the guards took shots at him –- happily, none with good enough aim to catch him at his current speed -– and he cleared the fence with, well. Enough room to spare that he was  _ fairly _ certain his trousers had not acquired any new holes.

The line shuddered suddenly, and began to slacken. He risked a glance backwards. 

The head of the guard stood in the window, holding the grappling hook in his hand.  As though he’d been waiting for Napoleon’s attention, he paused a moment more, then threw.

Napoleon cursed.  Glanced at the ground, decided to take a chance, and let go.

He hit the ground in a less-than-elegant tumble –- his shoulder would  _ not _ thank him for that later –- rolled to his feet, scooped his jacket up in a free hand, and kept running. Behind him, the hook hit the fence with a metallic clang.

The stretch of scrubby waste between fence and sea had not looked this long from the fourth floor.

“Hey,” Gaby said.

“Back up,” he said. If he was lucky -– if the hook had caught –-

The sudden roar of a motor filled the air, and the line beside him began to pull towards the sea.

More shots fired.

The line pulled taut -– the fence was holding. Napoleon reached the edge of the cliff and jumped, throwing his jacket over the line again and almost fumbling the catch. He tumbled into the boat with slightly more grace.

Gaby stood nearby.  She raised her sunglasses just high enough to give him an amused look.  “About time.”

She turned away, raising a hand and her voice.  “All right, boys, let’s get out of here!”

Napoleon did not look back.

#

One takedown of a particularly vicious drug kingpin (courtesy an unexpected betrayal by his head guard), and about a week later, Napoleon sat in their current safehouse, nursing a mild grudge and today's newspaper's crossword.

The door opened.  He glanced up, pointedly turned his attention back to the crossword, and said, "If you wanted to kiss me  _ that _ badly, you could have just done it the normal way."

"I do not think my employer would have approved of that course of action," Illya said. 

"Eh, they'd probably seen worse. Ah!" Napoleon filled in an answer; risked another glance up at the rustle of cloth. 

Illya was a great deal closer now. 

He stood, unwilling to give his partner the chance to loom, then had to resist the urge to lean back as Illya reached the edge of his personal space and inserted himself firmly inside it.

They were close enough now that Napoleon could feel the heat radiating off his chest; Illya was starting to lean in, head tilted ever so slightly sideways, a challenge (or was that a question?) in his eyes. 

Surely this was just some ridiculous game of chicken.  Surely Illya didn't  _ actually  _ intend to -

He did.

And, well. Napoleon Solo was not one to back down from a challenge.

Especially not one that was not ... entirely unpleasant.

An indeterminate amount of time later, an admiring whistle interrupted them. Illya drew the kiss to a lingering conclusion, and it took Napoleon far more effort than it should have to keep from following as he drew back. 

He unwound his arms from around Illya's neck (When had  _ that _ happened? What the hell, arms?) and crossed them as he turned to look at Gaby.  She looked like she'd just come in from the garage, in her coveralls with a kerchief in her hair and a broad grin on her face.

"About damn time," she said. Put one hand on her waist, cocked her head, and addressed Illya.  "What, don't I get one too?"

"Of course," he said, though there was a sardonic tilt to both his expression and Gaby's that Napoleon did not entirely understand.

They met each other halfway, and watching was ...

Well. Not entirely unpleasant, either. 

Eventually, they pulled apart.  Gaby turned towards him and raised an eyebrow.

Napoleon stared back. Still a bit thrown by this whole thing, and not entirely sure what she wanted. 

She sighed, rolled her eyes, and approached, wrapping her arms around his neck and tilting her face upwards.

… He could take a hint.

Napoleon Solo had kissed a lot of girls.  He knew how to take control of an encounter; how to guide it to a satisfying conclusion for them both.  More rarely, for girls whose tastes ran towards dominance, he could also follow. 

Kissing Gaby was not like either of these things. It was a partnership, a shared exploration, the scent of motor oil on her clothes and skin. 

It was rather like being kissed by Illya had been, actually.  (Minus the motor oil.)

Napoleon found himself reluctant to cut the encounter short, so eventually it was Gaby who pulled away. 

She made a halfhearted attempt at straightening her hair - Napoleon belatedly noticed and straightened his shirt; when had  _ that  _ happened? - and grinned at them both. 

"Now that that's settled," she said. "How about dinner?  I'm  _ starving _ ."

"I could eat," Illya agreed. They both looked toward Napoleon again.

"How about Antonio's?" he suggested.

He had no intention of backing down from this challenge, either. Wherever it led him - led  _ them,  _ next.  


End file.
